Common Sense... it's a thing.

So, my husband and I were driving to Hollywood the other day when we saw a white Toyota fly by in the carpool lane, going about 85. A clearly marked Highway Patrol car zipped in behind him and flipped on his siren. I’m not gonna lie, a little part of me was rooting for a high-speed chase. They’re so much fun. But what followed, was just bizarre.

The Toyota slowed to about 65, the speed limit, and continued on. This would make sense if the police car did not already have its lights on… but of course it did. The “chase” continued for about 10 miles, with the Toyota never making any attempt to speed away or move right in the surprisingly light L.A. traffic. I, of course, was glued to the window, screaming at my husband to maintain their speed so I could watch the whole thing unfold.

Finally, the Toyota awkwardly put on his blinker… his left blinker… and “pulled over” in the carpool lane. Refusing to be part of the lookly-lou brigade that suddenly stopped traffic on I-5, we were only able to catch the Highway Patrolman pulling behind the brainiac and screaming simply and elegantly into his bullhorn: “NO” before we drove away from the scene.

“Geez,” I said to my husband, “They seriously give driver’s licenses to anyone! They should make people take a basic common sense test before issuing those things out.”

“Why?” he asked, “We let people get married and procreate without common sense. Why not drive?”

This got me thinking – there are a lot of things in this world that would be better if we required a basic common sense test. You know, like where they ask you questions such as, “Which end of the baby is up?” and “True or False – Crocodiles make good pets?”

Since there are so many, I'm just going to list my top 20 activities I feel should require a common sense test. Feel free to add your own in comments.

1.     Have children – Just because you’re 16 and MTV is paying you does not qualify you to make babies. That being said, being 30 and not paid by MTV also does not qualify you.

2.     Name children – Moroccan is not a name.

3.     Get married – Shockingly, a marriage follows that super fun wedding you planned. Maybe you should put a tiny bit of thought into that as well, brides.

4.     Drive a car – Try driving five miles in L.A. Once you stop weeping, you’ll beg for this test… and population control.

5.     Own a pet – all pets, even a rock.

6.     Vote – This would totally screw the politicians.

7.     Hold a protest – You’ll find having a defined point and no streakers makes these much more effective.

8.     Lead a religion – Sorry Catholics…

9.     Use the Internet – Ok, you can use some parts. I mean, the economy would collapse completely if we only used common sense when shopping online. But no more commenting on news stories you barely skimmed, posting YouTube videos or Tweeting.

10.  Work at Taco Bell – If I have three tacos, why do you get all confused when I tell you two packets of hot sauce is not enough? A 5-year-old could figure that out.

11.  Write a book – Paris Hilton “wrote” a book. We need to stop this madness. Seriously, for the children.

12.  Join the military – We give these guys loaded weapons, maybe we should ensure they know which end the bullet comes out of.

13.  Be a cop – what a world that would be! Rather than ticketing me for going three miles over the limit you could ticket all those A-holes blocking the box and backing up traffic, or, I don’t know…solve a crime.

14.  Run a school system – Have a five-minute conversation with any graduate of the L.A. Unified School System and you’ll find yourself asking, “So, you graduated? And it was a real school? Not like in the basement of some church? Okay, well, there are seven continents not three and Obama is the 44^th president, not the 12^th.”

15.  Drink alcohol – you need to first possess those extra brain cells before you can kill them off, otherwise you end up with Snooki.

16.  Run a neighborhood association – I’m all for rules that ensure my neighbors never put tireless cars out on the front lawn or paint a rebel flag across their garage, but ticketing me for leaving my running shoes on the front porch? Come on!

17.  Design fashion – Whoever came up with skinny jeans should be shot in the face.

18.  Run a radio station – by all means, if little girls get all riled up over Justin Beiber then he should continue to make millions off them. I, however, should not have to be subjected to it on my morning drive to work.

19.  Make movies – I’m sure thousands of idiots across this great country have written a “brilliant” screenplay, and I applaud their efforts. Hobbies are healthy. But who keeps letting movies like Epic Movie and Disaster Movie actually get made?

20.  Own a gun – The only reason this is so low on the list is because the Darwin Awards make me laugh so much and like 80 percent are idiots with guns stories. It’d be sad to see those go.

You’ll note the use of recreational vehicles (4-wheelers, snow mobiles, etc.), ice fishing, hunting and gambling didn’t make the list. I didn’t forget about them. I just think they are effective tools in weeding out the dumber members of the species. It’s not evil, people, it’s natural selection.

I also left off starring in a reality show, because how much fun would it be to watch sane people full of common sense?

Dr. Em